Avoid The Mystery Guild Like The Plague!
Oct 07 '00
Anyone who reads as much as I do is naturally attracted by the deals offered by the many book clubs out there. After a number of years I have learned that with a few notable exceptions, almost ALL book clubs are not quite as great as they would like you to believe. Most book clubs-such as The Mystery Guild -offer you “unbelievable” deals-X number of books for a very low amount-a dollar, a penny, .99cents whateverplus shipping and handling-and you only have to buy so many books at a regular price in a certain period of time. What is unbelievable is that people are still falling for these “deals”.
Most of the book clubs out there right now operate under the same general guidelines. The Mystery Guild has a standard offer, standard guidelines and a standard “deal” for new members. Nearly 3 years ago now, I found a deal where I was to get 5 books from The Mystery Guild for .99cents plus shipping and handling and all I had to do was agree to buy X amount of books in X amount of time. I thought that this sounded like a great deal so I filled out the postcard and sent it in. I received my 5 books for .99 and approximately $20 worth of shipping charges-books are heavy-and most bookclubs DO NOT ship at book rate.
After I received my “free/discounted” books, I began receiving a monthly newsletter and order form from The Mystery Guild . In every newsletter there was a ”Selection Of The Month” offered – usually a set of three books by a variety of authors. There was always a wide selection of other books I could order instead of the monthly selection if I wished to. The main thing about the monthly newsletter was that IF I did not return the postcard sent with the newsletter in time-I would AUTOMATICALY receive the monthly selection –whether or not I wanted it. If I received the monthly selection and I didn’t want it then I had an even more limited amount of time in which to return the unwanted books.
A problem that I ran into at the beginning was that they kept shipping the books to an R. Sanchez-My first initial is F. No matter how many times I changed this, Informed them of the mistake my newsletters and unwanted books were sent to R.
This is where I really, really ran into problems. I kept forgetting to send the postcard back-naturally The Mystery Guild didn’t provide postage-you had to attach your own stamp. I kept getting shipments of books I did not want, and I didn’t always send those books back in time. I quickly realized that I was in a NO WIN situation, so I canceled my subscription to The Mystery Guild, Paid off what I owed them and let out a long sigh of relief. Those monthly selections I didn’t want ran $40.00 or more a month when the shipping and handling were added in- NOT SUCH A GREAT DEAL!
But it was over-I had held up my end of the bargain- I had purchased More than the minimum number of books I had to in the required amount of time. I had canceled my membership totally and completely. It was over-I had learned my lesson. Right? WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG!!!!!.
Fast forward about 2 and ½ years from when I cancelled my original membership. Out of the blue I started receiving those monthly newsletters again. At first I thought nothing of it-I had after all CANCELED my membership, I NEVER agreed to another membership, NEVER agreed to let The Mystery Guild re-instate my original membership. Since I didn’t have an active membership –why should I worry?
Then I started receiving shipments of the Selection of the Month. Most I sent back, Some I paid for simply because I never got around to shipping them back-and being an honest human being I felt that since I still kept the books I should pay for them. I did “cancel “ my NON-existent membership-several times in fact. Then I started getting THE BILL-for $182.00 from The Mystery Guild -for books I had returned, for books I had not ordered, for books I did not have. For books sent to me under a non-existent membership that I had never agreed to, never wanted!
I sent The Mystery Guild back a number of letters telling them-I don’t have these books, I did not order them, I never had or agreed to have a membership with your club. They kept sending me more bills for $182.00 and some odd cents. I started trying to call their long distance full charge number-no toll free numbers of course. It took me TWO weeks to finally get a hold of someone. When I did, I explained the whole situation, I explained that I had sent letter after letter after letter and never received a response. I explained the whole deal with the R. verses the F. I explained that there are two R.s living here- one is six years old-she can hardly read, much less have agree to a membership in a book club. The other R. reads only things that have to do with automotive or photography-nothing else. I explained that I Had at one point a membership with The Mystery Guild , but that I had long ago canceled that membership and that I had NEVER agreed to a new membership.
I was told at that time-that since NO ONE in this house had opened a membership, agreed to a membership or ordered any books that the bill was not valid and they would stop harassing me. She told me that I might receive another bill- but to ignore it-that it would take some time to work through the system. Finally! It was over! Or so I thought.
I did receive another bill-I ignored it-just as I had been told to. Then yesterday I received a new letter-this one from a collection agency-informing me that I have 30 days in which to pay this bill or challenge it. They did not provide me with a phone number-toll free or otherwise. So now I am going to have to send a certified letter explaining everything all over again. Regardless-I am not paying anyone $182.00 and some odd cents for books I don’t have, never ordered. And if I find out that this has affected either of the R.’s in my households credit ratting I may just go talk to an attorney.
I do not believe that my experience with The Mystery Guild is unique. I suspect that most people would pay the bill regardless of its validity to protect their credit ratting or because they felt that there was no choice. Well, my credit rating isn’t up for question and since the bill isn’t valid I am not paying it.
Book clubs such as The Mystery Guild make most of their money when people don’t return their postcards fast enough. Once you get a shipment of books, you are pretty much stuck with it-like it or not. The fact that The Mystery Guild re-instated a membership that had been canceled tells me that they likely practice this type of questionable business technique on a regular basis. I suspect that there are other people out there, like me who have been basically screwed by The Mystery Guild .
If you do end up joining any book clubs-Understand from the get go what the requirements are. Understand what you are supposed to buy, how much you are supposed to buy and figure out how much that shipping and handling is going to cost you.
-As I said at the beginning-I have found a few exceptions to the rule (I have also joined other book clubs-most of which had the same deal as The Mystery Guild -X amount of books-return the monthly postcard or else etc…-the main difference is that non of the other book clubs did what The Mystery Guild did by re-instating a canceled membership-big big difference.) Anyhow-the two exceptions I have found are The Scholastic Book Clubs -the ones offered by my daughters school-she brings home a paper telling me what books are available, we order what we want and pay up front.
The other exception has been The Mystery Library . I have been a member of this club for almost 10 years. Each month I get three paperback mysteries-their choice not mine. For this I pay a set price of around $13.00 including shipping and handling-since paperback books now run about $5.99 or more each-this is a great deal, I get to read authors I might never read and its not expensive.
If you become a member of one of these clubs- Make Sure You Send Back All Those postcards or be prepared to deal with the consequences.
Better yet-don’t join these types of book clubs-patronize your local used book stores, new book stores and avoid clubs like The Mystery Guild like the plague.
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mtbat
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Location: USA
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